This week was I will report on my field trip helping homeless people and also talk about my experience here during Christmas.
ă˛ă¨ăăăŽäź - Helping Those in Need
The âHitosaji no Kaiâ is a non-profit organization that helps homeless people by giving food and basic medicine and helping them to apply for social welfare they are entitled for. This organization is operating from a small temple called Kosho-in in the middle of Taito near Asakusa in Tokyo.
The homeless are typically outcasts and so they are usually not buried on their family burial site. With a lack of a proper burial site they fear that they will not only be homeless in life, but also in death. For this reason the Kosho-in temple provided a tombstone and therefore a proper burial site for the homeless. Passed away homeless people can have a proper burial ceremony there and people who want to remember or grieve for them can do so at this tombstone.
Later on they started to also help people in need with food and medicine. Twice a month the monks and volunteers from surrounding areas meet here, make onigiris together and sort through donations. Then they split up into several groups and visit nearby places that have a lot of homeless people at night. They distribute the food, some basic medicine and also flyers. They also try to help the homeless to fill out forms for social welfare they could be entitled for. They also distribute warm clothes and other things to keep the homeless warm during the cold season. This includes warm socks or sleeping bags (donations) or cardboard boxes to use as insulation mats.
This week I went to the temple and helped them out with the making of the onigiris and the distribution. This was part of a field trip in my âJapanese Buddhism and Social Sufferingâ course. I really liked the community vibe the preparations had. A lot of people from different age groups came together and worked towards a common goal: helping people in need. They prepared everything and talked and laughed together and it seemed like they had a genuinely good time there. The community aspect also helps the organization. People are more inclined to come back once they feel like their belong to the âHitosaji communityâ and so they might help regularly, instead of doing it as a one off kind of thing.
One of the most surprising things I learned from the field trip was the fact that a nearby Christian organizations is heavily involved in helping people in need in Japan. Not only do they help the people in need with food and shelter where they can, they also donated several tombstones to the aforementioned temple, so they have a place to bury the homeless. I think it is admirable to see a religious group helping people, who do not even share the same belief, just because they think it is the right thing to do. Also, it was astounding to see and hear about the tight cooperation between the Christian organizations and the temple. It made me happy to see that these two religious groups work together towards a common goal, instead of fighting against each other because of religious differences.
I also want to say something in regards to other temples in the area that donât do anything to help people in need. One of the several areas that the Hitosaji helpers were going to in search of homeless people in need was Asakusa. This struck me as odd, as there is arguable the biggest tourist attraction in terms of temples in Tokyo, Senso-ji. The amount of income this temple has from all the tourists flooding it everyday should be enormous, yet it is a small temple in the middle of nowhere that has to come to this area and feed and nurse the homeless people. I feel like the people at Senso-ji kind of missed the point of religion and at this point their temple is just a glorified amusement park at this point. The fact that a minority group in form of a Christian organization and a small neighborhood temple do more in terms of contributing to the society should make the people at Senso-ji ashamed.
All in all, I learned a lot during this field trip. I enjoyed helping the temple prepare everything and also distribute it. I am also shocked by the number of homeless people that emerge during night time in Tokyo. Up until now I never really saw a lot of homeless people in Japan and didnât think of homelessness as an important issue here. This field trip proved me wrong in that regard. However, seeing all these volunteers and monks working so passionately and always being so positive made me really happy.
Kurisumasu
Christmas in Japan feels a little weird. For starters, the Christmas season starts on the day after Halloween. You read that right, November 1st is the first day of the Christmas season. Imagine my confused face when I walked out on that day and Christmas music was playing and all the Christmas decoration as already outside. It just felt wrong.
Other than the music, the decoration and the special Christmas season Starbucks drinks nothing happens here. Christmas day rolls around and itâs business as usual in Japan. I mean that literally, I had classes on Christmas Day. You know, all my friends having a wonderful day with their family stuffing themselves with grandmaâs food and opening presents and all and Iâm sitting there in university contemplating my life decisions and trying to figure out where I went wrong to end up here.
Christmas here in Japan is more a romantic time. Usually on Christmas Day people go out on romantic dates. Those people who are sad that they could not find a date or families buy the Christmas special from KFC and eat that at home. I donât know why but that sounds kind of sad and awful. Well, to each their own. I just laid on the floor in my room and stared at the ceiling for two hours. Just kidding⌠Or am I?
Anyway, I had a lovely Christmas dinner with my other dorm mates and we basically ate ourselves into a food coma. I felt kind of ill from all the food afterwards. It was great. 10/10 would eat myself to sickness again.
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Thank you for reading and see you next time :)
Ash